Report: Forestry policy is working

There has been a dramatic decline in illegal logging in tropical forest nations over the last decade, according to a major new report from the Chatham House think tank that reveals improvements in forestry policy and enforcement are having a positive impact.

However, the report's authors were quick to stress that illegal logging remains a major problem that requires widespread improvements in policy and governance if a sustainable framework for managing tropical forests is to be developed.

The report found that global production of illegal timber has fallen by 22 per cent since 2002, while countries that have taken a proactive approach to tackling deforestation such as Brazil, Cameroon and Indonesia have seen levels of illegal logging fall by between 50 and 75 per cent.

The report analysed illegal logging in Brazil, Indonesia, Cameroon, Malaysia and Ghana, as well as processing of illegal timber in China and Vietnam, and the consumption of related end products in the UK, France, Netherlands and Japan.

It compared total imports of timber with legal exports of timber and found that production of illegal timber peaked in 2004 before falling 30 per cent by 2008.

It also calculated that over the last decade 17m hectares of forest saved from deforestation, preventing the release of up 1.2bn tonnes of CO2 at an estimated cost of just $3 per tonne.

Speaking at the launch of the report this morning, lead author Sam Lawson said there had been improvements in tackling illegal timber right across the supply chain. He said producer countries had successfully stepped up efforts to enforce forestry laws and implemented timber tracking schemes, while the EU and US had both moved to ban the import of illegal timber.

He added that businesses had also played a key role by increasing demand for timber that has been certified as legal – a move that meant that more than a third of timber produced in Cameroon and Malaysia is now certified – while NGOs had played a crucial role in pushing deforestation up the political agenda.

However, the report warned that the five consumer countries studied still imported 17 million cubic metres of illegal timber and wood products worth around $8.4bn in 2008, while last year saw 100 million cubic metres of illegal timber harvested in those producer countries studied.

Lawson said it was also getting harder to track illegal timber as loggers identify ways to get round certification and licensing schemes. For example, the report found evidence that some firms that had legally obtained licenses for logging were then illegally moving into neighbouring areas, before passing the resulting timber off as legally certified.

Samuel Nguiffo, Secretary General for Cameroon's Centre for Environment and Development, welcomed the improvements uncovered by the report but warned that further action was needed to not only enforce forestry laws but to ensure the laws themselves are tightened to encourage sustainable forest management.

"We should be happy that we are moving forward, but we have to remember that we started in the basement and have only just reached the ground floor," he said. "We can’t say that legality is the target. We need to put more sustainability measures into the law."

In the short term, Lawson recommended that producer countries continue to step up efforts to enforce forestry regulations and urged Japan to follow the lead set by the US and EU and ban the import of illegal timber.

He also welcomed the emergence of the EU's Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade (FLEGT) Action Plan, which sets out the framework for licensing legally obtained timber and has already been adopted by the Democratic Republic of Congo and Ghana.